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Sunday, February 26, 2017

Migrant Facts

Research
Director at UK National Institute of Economic and Social
Research ,Heather
Rolfe, told DW that the UK government's plans to reduce immigration
levels could have negative economic consequences.

There
is a widespread perception in the UK that immigrants, particularly
low-skilled immigrants, make more demands on services than they
actually do. If you look at the attitudes, people support high-skill
immigration and see the need for that. And they support
immigration by international students. People recognize
they are a benefit to the universities and the economy, but they are
much less happy about low-skill immigration and especially asylum
seekers and refugees.When
Romania and Bulgaria joined the EU, many
in the UK feared that
immigrants would overwhelm British state institutions and flood the
labour market.The real concern around
emigration from those countries was that it would put a demand
on services, schools, hospitals, housing and our benefits system.
The evidence is that that hasn't happened. In fact, those immigrants
were able to relieve skill and labour shortages in some of our key
industries.

Immigrants from those countries put
a third more into the economy with tax revenue than they took out
in benefits, such as health and education. The reason for this is
that a very high proportion of immigrants from those countries are in
work, and a much lower proportion are unemployed, compared to British
people. That's simply because they come to the UK to work. Also, it
is because they are young and healthy and tend to come without
children. Of course, the data also shows that if those immigrants
stay and settle, they'll be drawing on education in the longer
term. But they are already educated when they come to the UK,
which means that a lot of the cost to the economy has been borne by
the country of origin.

Immigrant
workers tend to be of a higher quality than the UK workers. Part of
the reason is education. Their higher standards of education
help them learn the job more quickly. But employers say that
they also have a different attitude towards work because they are
immigrants. They've come to the UK to change their lives, either to
get experience and money before going back home, or to make a new
life here. So their attitude is different, meaning they
will take extra work, extra shifts, they are more flexible
and seek promotions in a way British workers are not able
to do.